Filmmaker Michael Moore's brilliant and uplifting new documentary, "Sicko," deals with the failings of the U.S. healthcare system, both real and perceived. But this time around, the controversial documentarian seems to be letting the subject matter do the talking, and in the process shows a new maturity.

Unlike many of his previous films ("Roger and Me," "Bowling for Columbine," "Fahrenheit 9-11"), "Sicko" works because in this one there are no confrontations. Moore smartly lets very articulate average Americans tell their personal horror stories at the hands of insurance companies. The film never talks down or baits the audience.

At a press conference on Saturday, Moore said, "This film is a call to action. It's also not a partisan film."

Indeed, in "Sicko," Moore criticizes both Democrats and Republicans for their inaction and in some cases their willingness to be bribed by pharmaceutical companies and insurance carriers.

In a key moment in the film, Moore took a group of patients by boat to the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba because of its outstanding medical care. When they couldn't get into the U.S. naval base, Moore proceeded onto Havana where the patients were treated well and cheaply.

This has caused a great deal of controversy, with the federal government launching an investigation into the trip, which officials say was in violation of the trade and commerce embargo against the Communist country.

Moore, explaining the flap over the trip to Cuba in a press conference, said, "This administration flaunts the law, flaunts the constitution."

Moore now claims the U.S. government says his Cuban footage may be illegal, and Moore said he made a second master copy of "Sicko" and had it shipped it to France immediately just in case of potential government issues.

CANNES, France â "Sicko," Michael Moore's attack on the U.S. health care system, got a warm welcome at Cannes Saturday that marked the director's triumphant return to the film festival and a respite from the controversy his work has started at home.

More than 2,000 people applauded loudly after the film's first Cannes screening at the packed Grand Theatre Lumiere, the main festival auditorium.

"I know the storm awaits me back in the United States," said Moore as he absorbed the enthusiastic response of critics and journalists.

The movie doesn't open until late June, but it has already been criticized by conservative politicians in the United States over scenes in which the filmmaker takes ailing 9/11 rescuers to Cuba for treatment.

"It's very much in the Michael Moore vein _ hilarious, but I was crying through about a third of it," said Peter Brunette of the Boston Globe.

The trip to Cuba led the Treasury Department to investigate Moore for possibly breaking the U.S. trade and travel embargo on the communist country. He could face a fine or jail time.

Some have said the investigation is giving the film free publicity. Not Moore.

"I'm the one who's personally being investigated, and I'm the one who's personally liable for potential fines or jail, so I don't take it as lightly," he said.

On the advice of lawyers, the filmmakers spirited a master copy of "Sicko" outside the United States in case the government tries to seize it. Asked whether the inquiry could prevent the film opening in the U.S. as planned on June 29, Moore said: "We haven't even discussed that possibility."

Moore is a Cannes favorite. His last film, the war-on-terror documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" won the festival's top prize, the Palme d'Or, in 2004. "Sicko" is screening out of competition _ Moore joked that he didn't want to appear like a "typical American" by greedily seeking another trophy.

Stephen Schaefer of the Boston Herald thought the film might do even better at the box office than the President Bush-bashing "Fahrenheit 9/11," which took $122 million in the United States.

"This could do even more," he said. "This is an issue that impacts more people. It's a huge issue."

In an online review, trade magazine Variety called it an "affecting and entertaining" film that "alternates between comedy, poignancy and outrage."

Moore said "Sicko" was actually meant to be a quieter and more reflective movie than the rabble-rousing "Bowling For Columbine" or "Fahrenheit 9/11."

There are no scenes of confrontation to match Moore's buttonholing of politicians in "Fahrenheit 9/11" to ask whether they would send their children to Iraq.

Instead, there are ordinary Americans telling heart-wrenching stories of being refused vital treatment. Moore also travels to Canada, Britain and France to take a look _ possibly rose-tinted _ at their systems of socialized medicine.

"I decided to make a different film this time," Moore said. "I wanted a different tone and I wanted to say things in a different way.

Moore said he hoped audiences would focus on the film's message, not the controversy.

"Why would we allow nearly 50 million Americans to go without any kind of health coverage," he said. "That's not America."

But he may feel like applying a couple to himself after the mauling he received yesterday from several Canadian journalists â present company included â following the film's first viewing at the Cannes Film Festival.

"You Canadians! You used to be so funny!" an exasperated Moore said at a press conference in the Palais des Festivals.

"You gave us all our best comedians. When did you turn so dark?"

We Canucks were taking issue with the large liberties Sicko takes with the facts, with its lavish praise for Canada's government-funded medicare system compared with America's for-profit alternative.

While justifiably demonstrating the evils of an American system where dollars are the major determinant of the quality of medicare care a person receives, and where restoring a severed finger could cost an American $60,000 compared to nothing at all for a Canadian, Sicko makes it seem as if Canada's socialized medicine is flawless and that Canadians are satisfied with the status quo.

Moore makes the eyebrow-raising assertion that Canadians live on average three years longer than Americans because of their superior health care system.

I suggested to Moore that Sicko makes Canada's health system look so great, it wouldn't be surprising if Prime Minister Stephen Harper â of whom Moore is no fan â handed out DVD copies of it as campaign material in a future election.

Other Canadian journalists spoke of the long wait times Canadians face for health care, much longer than the few minutes Moore suggests in Sicko. Moore, who has come under considerable fire for factual inaccuracies in his films, parried back with more questionable claims.

"You're in a longer line than we're in because you get to live three years longer than we do. Why is that?" Moore said. "Why is it that a baby born in Toronto has a better chance of making it to its first birthday than a baby born in Detroit?"

Moore later back-pedalled on some of his praise, saying neither Harper nor regular Canadians should pat themselves on the back too much.

"It's not hard to do better than the U.S.," Moore cautioned. "The Canadian system, if you look on that list of the World Health Organization, is not that far above us. It's not like the French system. The French system is the best in the world."

Sicko doles out fulsome praise for the health care systems of France, Britain and Cuba, the latter featured in a highly controversial part of the film that has landed Moore in trouble with U.S. authorities.

He took several 9/11 emergency responders, all suffering chronic ailments they blame on their heroic tasks, to Cuba by boat to receive high quality and nearly-free treatments they claim they couldn't obtain in the U.S. Fidel Castro's government was only too happy to oblige.

First stop on the Cuban excursion, which is being investigated by the U.S. Treasury Department as a possible breach of American law, was to Guantanamo Bay, where suspected members of Al Qaeda and other terrorists receive superior medical care while under U.S. incarceration.

It looks like a classic Moore stunt, but he sounded genuinely chastened yesterday when he said that it could involve heavy fines or even a jail term for him, should the government choose to get nasty about it.

Sicko, to be released in North America on June 29, is by turns enlightening and manipulative, humorous and maudlin. It makes many valid and urgent points about the crisis of U.S. health care, but they are blunted by Moore's habit of playing fast and loose with the facts. Whether it's a case of the end justifying the means will ultimately be for individual viewers to decide.

It's a somewhat different film for Moore â although it looks a lot like Bowling for Columbine, his anti-gun screed he brought to acclaim here five years ago, which suggested that Canadians are so safe from gun nuts, they don't even bother to lock their front doors. But the movie is missing the familiar scenes of Moore hectoring politicians and business leaders, and he said that's no accident.

"I became very tired of all the yelling and screaming and not getting anywhere," Moore said.

He's also looking for a little bit of love â a big hug, perhaps? â for all the work he's doing in his films exposing corporate chicanery, gun mania, terrorism hysteria and now health care failings.

"I would hope by now, especially as I begin to enter the discourse on this new film, that I could catch a break," Moore pleaded.

Moore is a popular figure in Cannes. He was last here to present Fahrenheit 9/11 in 2004, which won that year's Palme d'Or.

Sicko is screening out of competition because Moore said he doesn't need another Palme d'Or.

The problem with Moore is that he ruins all his positive efforts by a few that diminish his credibility. If he just stuck to the facts, left out all the childish jabs and exagerated rehtoruc and drama he would actually make peop0le think seriously about his over arching themes. I don't understand why he hasn't figured out that he should not make a movie about his outrage but rather make a movie about the facts and let the audience find their own outrage.

To my knowledge, there were no serious lawsuits against Moore for his last film, and we shall see if the mega drug companies try to file suit against him for this next film, and/or try to get an injunction to prohibit the film from being showed.

If they don't, then rest assured that it is factual...

Quote from Mvic:

The problem with Moore is that he ruins all his positive efforts by a few that diminish his credibility. If he just stuck to the facts, left out all the childish jabs and exagerated rehtoruc and drama he would actually make peop0le think seriously about his over arching themes. I don't understand why he hasn't figured out that he should not make a movie about his outrage but rather make a movie about the facts and let the audience find their own outrage.